It’s commonplace for movies and TV shows to be dedicated to recently deceased members of the show’s crew, so much so that back in 2000, The Onion ran an editorial ostensibly written by a gaffer on Veronica’s Closet headlined “Thanks for Dedicating That Mediocre Sitcom Episode to My Memory.” The traditional white-text-on-a-black-screen dedication is a nice gesture, depending on the TV show and the episode, but it doesn’t give any sense of the person the show’s cast and crew are grieving. That’s natural on fictional shows—nobody wants Arli$$ to break character and start eulogizing a set designer in the middle of an exciting new episode of Arli$$—but there’s no reason a talk show can’t do better than that, and on Friday, Stephen Colbert did. Here’s his sweet, teary-eyed tribute to the show’s cameraman John Meiklejohn, who died last Saturday:

Odds are good that you have at least one thing in common with world-famous television host Stephen Colbert: Someone in your life whose support means more to you than they know. Let them know!